The right side of the tracks
December 1st 2008 Exeter keeps a close eye on council vehicles with Masternaut online tracking while
Cornish Councils gain fingertip control of fleets
The Masternaut Three X service is enabling Exeter City Council to
monitor its fleet of vehicles over the internet and provides
instant alarms if drivers exceed the 40 mph speed limit or stray
outside of the City boundary.The web-based satellite tracking system
has been fitted to refuse collection, street sweepers, community
patrol and car park operations vehicles.The system also incorporates
Driver ID keys to link drivers with specific vehicles.
Roll-out of the system is ongoing with each new vehicle
purchased by Exeter fitted with Masternaut telematics.There is also a
programme underway to retrofit some types of vehicles to gain
greater visibility of the fleet.
"We spent about two years investigating a real-time fleet
management solution and Masternaut Three X was able to prove that
its web-based service would give us exactly what we needed," says
Haydn Davies, fleet manager, Exeter City Council."Our key
requirement is pinpoint accuracy for tracking vehicles and the ability
to use the information to support the council in instances of thirdparty
claims.We can, for example, verify whether or not one of our
vehicles was responsible for causing damage and precisely who was
driving it at the time."
According to Davies, the real-time system allows individual
departments to drill down into custom reports for operational
purposes and is user-friendly."It gives a comprehensive tracking
solution that is flexible enough to meet the needs of each
department – Refuse Collection, Street Cleansing Community and Car
Parks.We have also been able to set up the system at different levels
allowing
management viewonly
access and
secure log-in for
administrators to
process updates.
Moreover,we can
readily adapt it to
meet our future
development
needs such as
route planning for
our Refuse
Collection
department."
Meanwhile in
Cornwall, Caradon
and North Cornwall
District Councils
have selected
satellite tracking for
managing fleets and providing the backbone to efficient routing and
rescheduling refuse collection rounds.
Masternaut Three X services allow tracking of refuse collection
vehicles, street sweepers, and housing maintenance vehicles with
pinpoint accuracy.The system also alerts managers and drivers of
speeding. Provision of lone-worker security enables managers to see
exactly where each vehicle is and helps them to keep track of
individual staff.
"We are very pleased with the Masternaut system, says Richard
Isbell, operations manager, Caradon District Council."We trialled
several other systems but this one provides a wider range of useful
features, offers greater capability for developing wider solutions and
is very user-friendly.We are developing the system to reschedule our
refuse collection rounds, and it is anticipated that this will provide a
significant boost in efficiency. Furthermore,we have encouraged
other departments to view the system and they have been
impressed and are looking at implementing the system within their
own departments.
"The beauty of the system is that we know that we have vehicle
information at our fingertips and it is very flexible.We can view
vehicle activities on any Internet-linked PC and we have equipped
the depots with large screens so that controllers and drivers can also
see what is going on throughout the day."
Isbell says that other Masternaut capabilities are under review,
including the possibility of implement the carbon-footprint reducing
Greenerfleet solution that integrates 'seamlessly' with the vehicle
tracking system and also allows mobile access to the system via
PDAs.
Every move you make
Masternaut's latest innovation is 'turn by turn' vehicle tracking to
boost vehicle movement logs with extra location information
captured at every turn.The company says pinpoint accuracy is crucial
for municipal services such as road gritting, street cleansing and
vehicle-based asset surveying.Masternaut already offers live tracking
with live updates almost seconds apart and says the turn by turn
data logging adds vital detail in urban areas dominated by numerous
streets, cul-de-sacs and pathways.Turn by turn tracking works by
sensing any 15° or greater turn of the wheel, ensuring movements
are recorded as a vehicle turns.The beginning and ends of streets are
accurately mapped so no section of street can be missed.
Masternaut is provided as a web service so live tracking and the
route data logs are made available via any Internet connected PC; no
special software is required. Masternaut onboard telematics can
connect to vehicle equipment sensors to record actual activity at any
point on route.This will show for example if brushes are up or down
on a street sweeper and whether grit is being dispensed from a
gritting vehicle. Please contact the
company for further details. More articles from Masternaut UK Ltd: | 
